The seas have remained relatively calm for the past few weeks making the run out of Matanzas Inlet a fairly easy one. For those willing to venture forty to fifty miles out you can find fish. Steve Martin did just that and was rewarded with amberjack, cobia and an african pompano. The wrecks and reefs closer inshore seem to be producing a lot of small red snapper and barracuda. Along the beaches the tarpon are still ravaging schools of pogys.
Last week Dan Rutkowski and I headed out in search of the silver king (tarpon). We cast netted a bunch of pogys from a small school and then headed in search of a school that would be holding tarpon. It didn’t take but a few minutes to find a large school with tarpon busting on them. We pulled up next to it and cast our baits out. It took about a minute and Dan was hooked up, it was his first tarpon encounter. The fish took off and had Dan’s reel screaming as it peeled off line. The fish made its first jump and we estimated it to be around 100 lbs. After many acrobatic jumps, some two feet from the boat, the fish surged quickly snapping Dan’s line. It sounded like a 22 rifle being fired when that line snapped.
After the line broke Dan turned and picked up his other rod and tossed out another pogy. It took about thirty seconds and he was hooked up again. This time the fish was smaller, about 65 lbs, and using heavier tackle the tarpon was boated, photographed and released. We fished a while longer and could see tarpon rolling and feeding but couldn’t connect with another one. I never did get a tarpon that day (1 shark) but it was still fun to see Dan land his first one.
Fishing in the ICW has improved over the past week or so. There is a large variety of fish biting right now. The other day Mike Broderick and Elise Broverman fished with me and the duo scored different species of fish. Ladyfish, jacks, mangrove snapper, black drum, redfish, flounder, trout and snook were all boated by the couple. Mike lost a couple of big fish. One he couldn’t stop and it broke off the line on a dock piling. The other picked up his shrimp and and took off so fast it just snapped the 10 lb test line. I think that fish may have been a 30 lb tarpon that I saw rolling just a few minutes before the bait was picked up.
Last Sunday I had a charter cancel so I decided to go fishing anyway. I was on the water before daybreak and made my first stop at a place that produces trout on an out going tide. I made a cast with a topwater plug and was instantly rewarded with a trout. I put the rod down and picked up the flayrod. After a few cast I laned a 19” trout. After about 30 more casts and a few missed fish I finally did something I’ve been trying to do for a while, I caught my first snook on a fly – 25”. The topwater bite quit so I changed my location and switched to a 7m mirrolure. I landed a 2½ lb and a 3 lb trout then called it a day.
Roy’s Baithouse reports that Paul Baudet fished the surf for whiting, blues and 2 small tarpon. Anita Dillon fished the ICW for a 2.11 lb flounder and Fuzzy Jim had 3 flounder – 15”, 18” and 20”


Photo: Dan Rutkowski with a 65 lb tarpon taken on a live pogy. The fish was released.